One For the Money
by zombie-rodeo-frog
Summary: Vince Tabarowsky, a hitman turned ghost hunter type of guy, has been sent to Amity Park to catch the notorious Inviso Bill. What could possibly go wrong? Rated T for violence and some language.
1. First Encounters

Hi, everyone! This isn't my first fanfic, not by any means. It is, however, the first that I managed to get long enough to be more than a page, enough to put on Seeing as it's the first one to climb out into the light of day, I would appreciate constructive criticism, and lots of it. Not flames. Flames will be used to toast marshmallows. So... here it is. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: Disclaimer's don't matter, because if they wanted to, the owners could sue the shirt off my back... if they wanted to. prays to the Spirits of Fanfiction

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**Chapter 1: First Encounters**

I leveled the blaster, calmly, slowly. Didn't want the kid to see the metal glint of it in the bushes where I was currently on stakeout. It whined softly as it charged, too quiet to make him think it was anything other than the normal night noises that he was used to, but too slow to get him if he ran off. I hoped nothing spooked him. This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. One that I would be very, very angry to lose.

The target? The Ghost Kid of Amity Park, otherwise known as Inviso-Bill or Danny Phantom (he seemed to prefer the latter.) Town opinion on this particular ghost was evenly split on the question of his being evil, but I, along with the rest of the ghost hunting community, knew ghosts came in only one flavor: bad. Even so, with his eyes glowing almost hopefully in the dimmness of the sodium lamps lining the streets, along with his reputation for sending other, bigger ghosts packing, one had to wonder... But I had a job to do, and I was going to do it. Phantom was being caught _tonight_.

_Steady...steady..._I trained the target lock on his floating form, fixing the center of the crosshairs directly on the DP insignia on his chest. Bingo.

_Beebee!_ The kid jerked out of his apparent trance and looked around wildly for the source of the sound. _Forgot to turn the lock sound off! _I thought, furious. Well, no use concealing myself _now_. I hefted the blaster onto my shoulder and jumped out of the bushes, and with the lock still on, fired. The powerful _woomph_ of the weapon firing made my ears ring, and I watched with satisfaction as the blue blast hit him on his side. Crackling blue electricity found its way all around his body, and he looked down at me with a mixed expression of anger, pain, and confusion.

Phantom fell out of the night sky, screaming. He hit the ground with a solid, earth-shaking _thud_, making a kid-sized dent in the solid concrete of the road. I switched the setting of the blaster to ectoplasmic energy net. He still didn't move, and his breathing was soft and shallow. Amazing that he was breathing at all, seeing as he didn't need to, but most ghosts clung to their living habits. I stared in strange fascination. Was it really going to be this _easy_, after all that I had heard about the ghost boy?

He groaned, then got up, blinking blearily and brushing some dust off of his suit. A bit battered, but not much worse for the wear, I saw, as he flew back up into the sky. A green glow formed around his clenched fists, and he glared at me. It was sort of disconcerting to have something that looked so human glower at you with eyes that looked like they could have powered a small city.

"Hey, watch where you're aiming that thing!" he yelled. I growled. Most ghosts would have been down and out already, but this one was apparently made of sterner stuff. I ignored him and charged up the blaster again, this time setting it on the 5, the highest setting. Most ghosts would be vaporized, but if a power level 3 blast hadn't taken him out, I doubted that it would matter. I leveled the blaster again, peering through the crosshairs to the kid. But he suddenly wasn't there anymore.

I heard a whooshing sound coming towards me, then something like a semi truck hit, knocking me over end over end. I bounced to a painful halt several meters away, feeling a fire grow in my ribs.I was winded, and got up with a gasping groan, clutching my ribs. It seemed like my whole body was on fire, but I couldn't concentrate on the pain right then. There was a hostile spirit on the loose...one that was after me, now. I reached for the blaster, but it wasn't there. It wasn't anywhere next to me, and I didn't have anything else to defend myself with but a small ghost pistol. Judging by how Phantom had handled the blaster, I didn't think that the pistol would do much.

"Damn," I hissed, forcing myself up and drawing the gun. The blaster appeared in front of me. I made a grab for it, but it pulled back just in time for me to fall on my face like an idiot. I did not like this. I was a large man, just by heredity. People were intimidated by me, I would admit, and I didn't mind at all. In fact, by now I expected it. But here...size really didn't matter. This kid was like an _insect_ compared to me, and he was beating me pretty handily. It was time to think up a different strategy.

The weapon in front of me sizzled with green light and broke in several places, sparking. Definitely time.

"Given up yet?" asked the ghost boy, turning visible and tossing the ruined blaster down at my feet. "I just want to get this over with, it's almost curfew..." The town clock, somewhere downtown, began ringing. "...correction, _past_ curfew."

"Okay, okay," I said, playing along. "Just let me get what's left of my blaster..." I winced as I bent down and picked the ruined weapon up. The kid looked almost...sympathetic? Unexpected, but no hindrance.

"Now just stop bugging me, okay?" asked the kid imperatively. "I've got enough problems as is."

"Like _this?_" I yelled, wrenching myself up and drawing the pistol. I held it up to his suddenly paler face. "This gun shoots a poison, you realize. Deadly to ghosts. If it hits you, even _clips_ you, your existance is _over_." I was bluffing, of course. Weaponized ghost toxins did exist, but I had unfortunately left them all in the hotel room.

"Uh, uh, take it easy there, big guy," he blustered. "I'm sorry about your gun, I really am, just _don't shoot me with that thing!_" His eyes crossed to look down the barrel, straight my eyes (which I was sure were suitably cold and unforgiving.)

"Just come with me," I said, "and I promise I won't shoot." Phantom nodded and gulped. "Now get in front of me, and we'll walk to the hotel. Any funny business, and I pull the trigger. Understand?" He nodded again, very enthusiastically. I might have been going a little hard on him, but I really didn't care what happened to him as long as he wasn't completely destroyed by the time I got back to DALV.

It was then that a large vehicle that looked like a cross between an RV and a tank two-wheeled the corner in front of us and drove screaming towards the ghost boy, and me behind him. It screeched to a halt, digging large tracks into the road. Suddenly, the doors flung open and two people in hazmat suits (resembling Phantom's, I noted) jumped out. They both drew menacing-looking, large weapons, aiming them at him. Red laser sights that looked like they were trained on his forehead beamed from both of the guns.

"Freeze, ghost kid!" yelled the larger one in the orange, who was even bigger than I was. "We've got you _surrounded!_"

"Yeah," I could hear him mutter. "By _two people_." I had to admit that he had a point.

"And let go of that poor man behind you!" yelled the other, female hunter in turquoise. I could hear the weapons whining as they charged up. Both pulled the trigger on their respective weapons, and I waited for the ghost kid to crumple down to the ground in a smoking heap of ectoplasm. Unfortunately, nothing happened, and my triumphant smile turned to a more familiar scowl.

"Jack," asked the woman. "Did you forget to charge the weapons _again?_"

"I told Danny to do that!" exclaimed the man.

"Does he _ever_ do his chores?"

Jack smacked the weapon into his gloved palm. "When I get home, I'm going to give that boy a good talking-to about this. That, and the curfew." I heard Phantom sigh unhappily at this one. Then, before I could react, he went invisible. I kicked the air in front of me, but he had already flown off somewhere else. I looked around, the twilight shadows messing with my vision. Was that him, or was it a trash can? A flash of motion turned out to be a bird. The streetside lights only lit up the streets below them, and the ghost kid could be _anywhere_.

"Where are you, Phantom?" I yelled angrily to the sky, pointing the gun around randomly. "Remember, if I hit you, you're _dead!_"

"He's already dead, actually," said the woman. "But unless you have some sort of ghost toxin..." She peered at my gun. "I'm sorry, but that gundoesn't do _that. _It'll fire an ectoplasmic blast, sure, but that won't wipe him out."

"I already knew that!" I yelled in abject frustration. "I was _bluffing!_" I heard a chuckle coming from my right.

"Might have wanted to play _that_ a little closer to the vest," said a voice from the air. Phantom. I growled and fired, but it went past where the kid would have been and ricocheted off a bus bench into the night. I threw the gun to the ground and glared sullenly at it.

"Oh..." said the woman again. "So you're hunting him, too?"

"If it wasn't already immediately obvious, _yes_."

"Well then, join the fold!" exclaimed Jack, radiating exuberance. "I'm Jack Fenton, and this is my lovely wife, Maddie." He pulled her to his side and they both smiled at me, encouragingly. "And you are...?"

"Vincent," I said, begrudgingly. "Vince Tabarowsky."

Maddie gave me a sympathetic look. "We're sorry about Phantom escaping, you know. We've been hunting him ever since he showed up a few months ago, and we've never caught him either."

"Well..." Jack amended, "We caught him once, but then I had to let him go so I could escape _another_ ghost..." I bent down and picked up the useless ghost gun and my broken blaster as he began to talk excitedly about his family's ghost-hunting exploits. _Well_, I reflected bitterly, _there is no lesson in success_. I knew a little bit more about the kid now, and next time, I would come prepared. I waved a vague goodbye to the Fentons, still talking, and began my long, trudging way back to the hotel, limping slightly.

"Say, Vince," said Jack. "You look pretty beat up. Do you want us to give you a ride home?"

I decided to accept the offer. "Sure..." I limped back over to the Fenton's GAV, as they called it, Jack explaining the strange name to me as I climbed in the back and promptly fell asleep, dignity be damned. I probably had abruised rib or two from my impromptu tumbling act, and I didn't want to make it worse.

Next thing I knew, Maddie was shaking my shoulder, asking me something. I blinked at her for a few seconds before my brain woke up along with the rest of me.

"We didn't know where you lived, so we just decided to bring you here, to our house. Do you mind?" she asked.

"No, no," I said. "This is fine. Great." She grabbed my arm and guided me out of the GAV into a large, red-brick house. I glanced up and caught a glimpse of a green neon sign hovering ominiously over my head, surrounded by a few stars higher up,before I walked in through the front door and was sat down on a couch. I sat there in a sort of bleary daze there for a few minutes, listening to the parents try to wheedle the kids into letting me stay.

"C'mon, kids!" exclaimed a voice from the other room. "He's a fellow ghost hunter! A comrade in arms! A friend!"

"And you met him...what...thirty minutes ago? He's probably some hobo off the streets!"

"Just give him a chance."

Two frustrated sighs. "...Alright," said one voice, hesitantly, "but if he starts being all creepy, he's _out_." The adult Fentons marched into the room, followed by two reluctant children.

"Well, kids, this is Mr. Tabarowsky," said Jack. "And Vince, these are our kids. This is Jazz..." he gestured towards a pretty redheaded teen, who smiled nervously, "...and this is Danny." He pointed over to a sort of prepubescent, black-haired boy who had, it seemed, perpetual bedhead. He glowered at me, a look that looked strangely familiar. I gave him a deadpan stare in return, then looked up to a smiling Jack.

"Beautiful kids, Jack, Maddie, really," I said, trying to sound convincing. The redhead, Jazz, seemed normal enough. But Danny...I'd never met anyone so immediately _hostile_, and at a first meeting, no less. I accidentally let loose a loud yawn, and the parents immediately looked apologetic.

"Oh, but you must be tired," said Maddie, taking hold of my arm again and dragging me upright. "You can have Danny's bed." She turned to her son. "I hope that you don't mind, sweetie." He said nothing. I had to give him credit where credit was due: he was stubborn enough. If he decided to not talk, those lips were sealed.

"Follow me!" exclaimed Jack. I trailed the adult Fentons up the stairs, noticing out of the corner of my eye the two children below.

"What was _that_, Danny?" hissed Jazz. "I really don't like him being here _either,_ and I at least _tried_ to be friendly!" She elbowed him in the side. Surprisingly, he yelped in pain and drew back, shielding his side with his arms in an instinctive, animalistic gesture. I missed the rest of this exchange, however, as I walked into the bedroom.

"Now, I understand that Danny's room is a mess," Maddie explained. "He's a packrat, just like his _father_..." She gave Jack a look. I, meanwhile, surveyed the boy's room.

Posters of rockets, astronauts, and varied musicians coated his room like a sort of second layer of wallpaper. Model rockets in various stages of completion littered his desk and the floor. Clothes, predictably, were flung everywhere but his hamper, and half-done homework littered his desk and most things around it. Glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to his ceiling, opening it to an imaginary nighttime cosmos. This was just an ordinary boy's room, nothing out of the ordinary.

"He's always wanted to be an astronaut," said Maddie. "But right now, he just doesn't have the grades for it." She gave me a quick look to see my reaction. "He's a good boy, he really is. But he's changed this year. Coming home late, beat up..."She sighed, then changed the subject eagerly."But now, our Jazz is a different story..." She laughed nervously. "Well, anyway, good night." She and Jack left the room and turned the light out as I crawled under the sheets, falling asleep soon after.

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I woke up with a start, disoriented and almost panicked, nearly strangling myself with the light blue sheets. Hazy, half-forgotten dreamscapes floated around in my conscious for a few moments before I remembered where I was. Stretching and yawning noisily, I looked around. Early morning sunlight streamed in through the window, painting the room a warm, light shade of red-orange. I got up and opened the door, peering out to see if anyone else was awake.

Fragments of a conversation drifted upstairs, along with the appetizing smell of waffles and bacon. I decided to head downstairs, making a pit stop in the bathroom to check if I looked presentable. They had, after all, given me a place to stay for the night; the least that I owed them was an acceptable appearance.

On my way down the stairs, I saw the two Fenton siblings coming up, looking as cheerfuly awake as some dead undertakers. They ignored me, instead concentrating on climbing up each step.

"Good morning," I said, as civilly as possible. Two pairs of eyes glared at me.

"Do you have any idea what _time_ it is?" asked Jazz. Without letting me answer her rhetorical question (I usually did,) she went on. "It's, like, six fifteen." I shrugged, then continued down the stairs.

"No, Maddie," I heard Jack say as I entered the kitchen. "It won't really _mash_ the ghosts...More of a blender-action thing, really. Say a ghost gets sucked into it..." I saw him move his hands in a karate-chop sort of move. "And voila! Ghost puree."

I coughed discreetly. "Oh, hey, Vince!" said Jack. "Do you want to hear about the new Fenton Blender?" He pressed a button on a silvery weapon that was lying on the kitchen table. It whirred threateningly. Jack smiled widely, looking down at the thing with an expression that could only be described as fatherly pride.

I pulled out a chair and sat down, leaning an elbow on the table. "I'd love to hear about it..." Jack took in a deep breath, and I stopped him just in time, "...but I'd appreciate it if you would tell me more about this Danny Phantom. That's why I'm here...I got sent here to catch him and bring him back to DALV Co.'s laboratories as some sort of government sponsored program."

"If we were to help you catch him, would we, say, get a cut of the profits?" asked Maddie shrewdly. "Just hypothetically."

"...Of course," I said, slightly caught off guard. "And I would appreciate the help...if you were to."

"Sign us up, then!" said Jack.

I shrugged. "Okay. But first, I'd just like to know a little bit more about this ghost boy from professionals like you." I could almost see their heads swell.

"Well..." asked Maddie, "What would you like to know about him? Powers? When he first appeared?" I nodded at this one. "Okay, then. It was a few months back, right around when school started... we have the exact date around here somewhere. Anyway, there was this ghost that appeared that controlled meat, apparently, and it was attacking the kids' school, Casper High, and the vegitarians' rally that was there. The ghost kid was there, too, and he fought her for a while. I guess the ghost kid took care of her, because we haven't seen any sign of her since.

"There were a lot of other incidents involving Phantom, especially at Casper High... there was that Penelope Spectra thing, among others. Also, the _government_, if you can believe that, sent in some ghost hunters to try to capture him... Didn't work, of course."

I nodded. "So... what are his abilities, exactly? Pretty basic, or advanced?"

"Oh, they're pretty advanced," said Jack. "He keeps getting new powers, we think. When we first saw him, and for the first month or so, he just had intangibility, invisibility, and flight. Then, sometime around late October, he got an ectoplasmic energy blast. Lately, he can shield himself, and we've had some people tell us that he can duplicate himself and even perform some sort of howling attack. Very destructive."

I was pretty impressed, but I didn't let it show. "Anything else that you know?"

"Well... there's the Red Hunter, who you could try to find... She's usually riding Phantom's tail if he's out. And Danny's friends have been seen with him, too." Maddie sighed. "Why, I don't know."

"Has Danny been seen with him?"

"Once, when our house's mainframe was posessed, but that was the only time."

I switched subjects. "Jack...Maddie... do you think that there could be any way that I could be at the school, you know, teaching or something?"

Jack looked confused. Understandably. Someone who looked like they would have been happier being a bodyguard didn't seem like the type to teach children. "Why would you want to do that?"

"Well, seeing as Phantom seems to haunt the school, it could be a good base to start off of..."

They seemed to consider it for a while. "We'll see what we can do, Vince. Want us to drive you over right now?" asked Jack.

"Yeah," I said, "that would be good."

Several minutes later, I wasn't so sure. I clutched the cloth of the seat in a desperate bid for safety and sanity as the GAV rounded a corner on one tread, seeming to disobey both the laws of traffic and physics. Even though a logical part of my mind said that in the contest between the vehicle and a building, the GAV would win, the larger, panicked part screamed that one could only go through so many brick walls before hitting a stronger steel one. Fear, oncesuch an alien emotion, flooded through my body as I saw cars on either side of the street pulled over to let Jack pass. This happened all the time. This was _commonplace_. This would happen again, most likely with me in the car,losing whatever I had been able to eat after I heard the bad news,as we drove over the edge of a cliff and pulled a Wiley Coyote on the canyon bottom far below. I felt, for the first time in my life, insignificantly small in the great scheme of things.

"JACK!" I managed to yell through my oncoming nausea. "COULD YOU PLEASE SLOW DOWN!"

"What?" he yelled back.

"SLOW THE CAR DOWN!"

"I think that he wants you to slow down, sweetie," said Maddie ahead of me, patting Jack on the arm. "You should probably do that, he's looking a little pale."

"Do I _have_ to?" However, he did comply, screeching to a stop at the next red light instead of screaming through it like he usually did. I wondered if Hell's residents were having snowball fights. They were probably sledding by the time that we pulled in slowly, in a near stately way, to the parking lot at Casper High, to whatever insanity resided within.

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Like it? Hate it? Well, tell me so in a review!

And yes, that last part is "inspired" by Kindergarten Cop. Don't hate me.


	2. Unexpected Visitors

ZOMG! I live! And I bring with me from my semi-death Chapter 2.

**Disclaimer: No posesso DP. No speako Espanol. Tu speakas? **

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**Chapter 2: Unexpected Visitors**

I pushed open the double doors to Casper High, like you would see in an old Western. I like to make an appearance. My one vanity, I would consider. Black suit? Check, though a little bit rumpled and wearing thin at the elbows, knees... well, everywhere, but ghost hunting was not exeptionally profitable. My black hair, buzzed short, blended very nicely, I thought, with the rest of my black outfit. I had forgotten my sunglasses (FBI style,) though. They were probably lying in pieces on some Godforsaken street in this Godforsaken town by now.

The first thing I noticed about the inside of the building was the noise. Adolescents screamed, they ran for cover, they held excruciatingly boring conversations about the latest fall fashion lineup. The decibel level was one that I would usually expect to hear with an ear up to artillery being fired. But as far as I knew, artillery was't allowed in public schools. (Yet.)

The second thing I noticed was the surprisingly avacado-shade paint that decorated most of the inside of the building. It coated lockers. It coated walls. It surprised me that the children's eyes' hadn't exploded.

The third thing that I noticed was Danny Fenton, the son of the two parents, being shoved into a locker by a large, blonde, violent-looking boy. The big one looked angry.

"_Fenturd!_" he yelled, still trying to fold the kid into a shape that would fit into a locker. "_Why...won't...you...fit!_" He accentuated each word with a shove, his face contorted into an almost-feral rage. Danny rolled his eyes between little grunts of pain.

Fenton, on the other hand, looked bored (if in pain.) His expression, far from the panicked-hunted-animal look that I would have seen on any child that _I _would have shoved into a locker, said plainly, _I haven't got all day, you know_. And apparently, he didn't, as the bell rang right above my head and the students flooded into their respective classes. Fenton landed, grabbed his books out of his locker, and headed to his first period class along with the rest of them. The only damage he seemed to have gotten was something on his leg, I thought, as he hobbled away. _Weird_.

The other two Fentons, equally weird in a different way, barged in through the door. They actually _kicked_ it open, if you can believe that. So cliche. So amateur. Any hitman-in-training can tell you that even they, contrary to popular belief, do not kick open doors.

"_Where'stheghost_!" yelled Jack, drawing a weapon out of who-knew-where and waving it threateningly. Maddie and I gave him a look, and he put it down, looking contrite. "Sorry," he explained. "Force of habit."

"Let's just get to the office," I said. We were wasting time. I just wanted to get the ghost kid and leave. Maddie, sensing my exasperation, led the way to a large door on our left, a stained wood that seemed to be the exact shade that would least go with the avacado paint. We entered the office, which was just as odd-looking as the rest of the school.

A hideous potted plant squatted menacingly on the secretary's desk, leafy fronds draped over the sides of the pot in a decidedly octopus-like gesture. Some chairs surrounded a small table in the middle of the room, throwbacks to some bygone time when chairs didn't nesscesarily need cushions, arms, or most of their legs. A couch, a shade of puce that didn't agree with my stomach, sat heavily against the wall near the door, looking like it would would swallow the next person who dared to sit on it. A few pictures involving children, bicycles, and young animals hung lopsidedly on the walls in a halfhearted attempt to beat back the awfulness of the rest of the room. It was an altogether horrible place.

The secretary glanced up at me, saw the Fentons, grinning in their spandex jumpsuits, as well, and let out a long, world-weary sigh. She pressed down a button on her desk, and held a microphone up to her mouth. "The Fentons and someone else..." she paused and put the microphone down. "What's your name, sir?"

"Vincent Tabarowsky," I said, at my gruffest. The secretary shrank back a little bit and picked up the mike again.

"The Fentons and a Vincent Tabarowsky to see you, Ms. Ishiyama," she continued.

"Is it important?" a loud voice said over the office intercom, very brisk, businesslike. "I don't want to see them if it isn't important. You know that, Sherry. Actually, I usually don't want to see them at all." The voice laughed at its own joke.

There was a long pause, in which Jack and Maddie Fenton looked very offended and the secretary looked like she was holding back laughter.

"...They heard me, didn't they? I hate this new office intercom; second time this _week _that this has happened... Remind me next time, Sherry," said Principal Ishiyama, sounding slightly embarrassed. "Well, I guess that they can come in... It's not like I have anything better to do with my time besides watch reruns of the Brady Bunch."

We opened the door to her office and headed in, sitting down on some chairs that were probably made for kindergarteners. Jack's chair creaked uncomfortably underneath his weight.

"So..." said the principal, elbows on her desk and fingers steepled. "What sort of ..._madness_, really, do you want me to let you two do in my school?" She leaned back in her high-backed exectutive chair, which I was sure had cost several rare animals their lives.

"Well..." said Jack.

"I'd like to find a job here," I interrupted, before he said anything stupid. "Inviso-bill haunts this school, correct?"

"Yes...?" said Ishiyama, clearly not getting the point.

"I'm a ghost hunter," I explained. "Meaning that I - " I saw the Fenton's faces, looking very expectant, out of the corner of my eye. "I mean _we_ want to catch Invisobill. Send him to the government for them to vivisect. You know, that sort of undercover thing."

"I'm afraid that we don't have any spaces open for a new teacher," she said apologetically. "Sorry."

"Are there any _other_ jobs that I could take?" I asked, exasperation filling my voice.

She grinned, a nasty, vengeful sort of grin that probably would have looked better on one of my former colleagues. I decided I didn't like her.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

I glanced up at the students rushing out of the door to weekend freedom, too busy to give them the stony glare that I reserved for occasions such as these. Too busy with what? you might ask. Leaning against the wall and being generally sullen and bad-tempered? Thinking about different ways that you could catch Phantom?

No, I would respond, and then I would fling you against one of the vegetable-shaded lockers hard enough to dent it. I mentioned before that I valued appearance. It gives others a hint of who you are and what pain will be brought if they mess up.

Unfortunately, janitors cannot wear black suits, no matter how threadbare and worn.

I was busy, to answer your question, mopping the floor where some kid had thrown up a few minutes previously. I was wearing a blue, jumpsuit-like janitor uniform that made me look like some overgrown space cadet, and I was hating every minute of it.

"I'm hating every minute of this," I said to Principal Ishiyama as she walked through the clearing halls. She gave me another demon grin.

"It was your decision to come here," she said, shrugging unapologetically. "You got the job, now do the work." I mopped harder, throwing up a small spray of soapy water and vomit.

"I hate vomit, too," I decided. "I hate everything." If I had been on stakeout, I would have been satisfied. I would have enjoyed being shot at by my target at this point. But no. Being a janitor has a certain air to it, one of indignity and swallowed pride. People sense it. And then they laugh at you.

To add insult to injury, I wasn't even getting _paid_. "You already have a job," had said Ishiyama, sounding pleased with herself for coming up with this latest boredom-buster. "And besides, you're not really a janitor. You're just standing around, _looking_ like a janitor." I wish that she had told the custodial staff that; despite my explanations and badge-flashing, they had suited me up and sent me out to clean up the various scholarly messes that needed cleaning up. And, of course, I had to remain _low-key_, as my superiors had so patiently explained. No theatrics. That took what little joy there was in the job completely out of it.

I looked down at the floor to see how progress was. Not very much, I saw. The vomit was thoroughly mixed with the mopwater now, and spread across the tile floor as well. I poked one of the more suspicious-looking chunks with the mop, carefully. What had that kid been eating? I was not a very good janitor, I decided. Maybe I should have tried for something more like cafeteria worker.

And besides, janitor was one of the worst jobs I had ever held, coming in admittedly close second to "live bait."

And then something happened. I didn't see it, hear it, anything like that. But I felt it. A shiver ran down my body unexpectedly, even as the stark fluorescent lighting flickered ominously.

"Welcome to my school, Mr. Tabarowsky," said a voice behind my back, dark and full of strangely rich menace. "I hope that you have a decidedly _unpleasant _stay." I felt something hit the back of my head, smelled something burning. And then I saw nothing, as blackness trickled down my vision.

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Yes, I know that that is, like, the most cliche cliffhanger in existance, and this is a ridiculously short chapter. But what else can you do? 

Well, you could tell me by pushing that litttle purple-blue button down there. You know.


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